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In Disney's World, a Perfect Freeway

THIS summer's celebrations for the 50th anniversary of Disneyland have brought renewed attention to one of its most popular attractions, a pint-size freeway that predated most of the real freeways of California.

The only attraction in the park's Tomorrowland area that remains basically the same as it was on Disneyland's opening day in 1955, Autopia was Walt Disney's vision of the fun that would arrive on the freeways of the future.

Autopia's survival is testimony to the persistence of an abiding dream of the ideal highway. The automobile as an icon of personal freedom survives as a theme park diversion, defying the reality of smog-generating traffic just outside the gates.

With little cars on cloverleafs, overpasses and multilane straightaways, Autopia was a hit from the beginning, a time when the concept of free-flowing limited-access highways was still being developed. In July 1955, the Santa Ana Freeway was new and legislation to finance the Interstate highway system was months away from being signed by President Dwight D. Eisenhower.

The ride evoked memories of the Magic Motorways exhibit at the General Motors pavilion of the 1939 World's Fair, where multilane freeways were predicted, though only as scale models, for a miraculous future that would come to pass by 1960. Walt Disney said in 1955 that he hoped Autopia would give visitors the feeling they were really driving on California's freeways.

A "midget freeway" was the description Karal Ann Marling, a professor at the University of Minnesota and a scholar of pop culture, gave to Autopia, with its swelling deciduous trees (in place of indigenous palms) and soothing desert ponds. But Autopia was barely ready on opening day. Prof. Marling, editor of "Designing Disney's Theme Parks," (Flammarion, 1998) noted that Tomorrowland was far from complete -- and was the least thought-out area of the park -- when it opened. The completion of Tomorrowland was left, it seemed, mostly until tomorrow.

Autopia ran, but not well. After the first day, many of the 39 cars initially put into service -- one from the original production run had been set aside for Walt Disney -- were broken. Four that had been treated to the black-and-white paint scheme of police cruisers were soon repainted as conventional models.

The cars' fiberglass bodies were designed by Robert Gurr, a graduate of Art Center College of Design in Pasadena, Calif., who spent two weeks in Detroit before deciding that working for an automaker was a dead end. A job at Disneyland, where he could design the whole car, was more attractive.

He tried to produce vehicles unlike the traditional stubby bumper car, with proportions closer to full-size vehicles. His design, approved by Disney himself, was inspired by Ferraris of the time.

"We wanted more than a bumper car ride," Mr. Gurr said. "We thought of it as a ride where kids could learn to drive the freeways of the future."

But the cars ended up smashing and banging into each other, he said. The idea of allowing the cars' steering and speed (up to about seven miles an hour) to be controlled entirely by youthful drivers was rethought. The roadway lanes were narrowed by dividers, and eventually guide rails were added.

So popular was the Autopia that a Junior Autopia for younger visitors, with pedal extenders in the cars, was added. The body designs evolved over the years, too. Mr. Gurr is especially proud of the Mark VII bodies of 1967, whose shapes and surfaces echoed those of the Chevrolet Corvette. That design served from 1967 until 2000, when new models were installed.

The Autopia idea of freeway driving may seem like a joke today, but it was a fresh and futuristic vision for Walt Disney in the mid-1950's, much like his devotion to the monorail as a transportation solution. The vision grew out of Main Street imagery, not a science-fiction fantasy. Some of the first sketches for Autopia show an entrance that looks like the roof of a drive-in restaurant; the central building was modeled on the shape of an engine piston.

Other Disney parks around the world have their Autopias or an equivalent. At Walt Disney World in Florida it became the Indy Speedway. The version in Europe, near Paris, retains the Autopia name but is assigned to Discoveryland and offers carefully groomed boxwoods in a style reminiscent of the gardens at Versailles.

Disneyland has its own legends, like any enterprise, and the folklore includes a story of Sammy Davis Jr., an early visitor, being knocked from a car into the bushes. Employees are rumored to have driven Autopia cars to the studio of the Mickey Mouse Club television show, where they tried to persuade Annette Funicello, a favorite star, to hop in for a ride during breaks from filming.

In 2000, the original ride was updated with new cars: Suzy the zippy compact, Sparky the sports car and Dusty, an S.U.V. Today, riders are issued Autopia driver's licenses. They pass by billboards and a sign warning "Mouse Crossing."

Other amusement parks have auto-based rides, but few have the following of the original Autopia. It embodied a whole world view. Bumper cars may offer the fulfillment of drivers' fantasies to smack the discourteous driver in the next lane, but Autopia still offers an indulgence of a different fantasy: that a society built around the automobile would be an ideal future.

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A version of this article appears in print on August 22, 2005, on Page D00010 of the National edition with the headline: AUTOS ON MONDAY/Design; In Disney's World, A Perfect Freeway. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe